On Sat, 19 Jun 2004 10:37:54 -0700, Alexandre Julliard wrote:
d) They need something that isn't part of the standard packages (for instance BiDi support).
Is there a reason that can't be dlopened too? relaytool makes it much less hassle to write dlopened code.
e) They want to report a crash and need debug symbols to get a valid backtrace.
Red Hat have developed a neat solution for this, the latest binutils can split debug symbols into a separate set of files so you can just install debuginfo packages and gdb will automatically use them.
f) They want to try a patch that someone sent them.
How often does that occur, really? I bet about 1% of our users actually do this.
I don't see why that should be a goal at all. You guys need to get rid of the mindset that building from source is some 1337 thing that mere mortals are not supposed to do.
I wouldn't say not supposed to do, but rather that they shouldn't *have* to do it.
There are plenty of legitimate reasons for users to build from source, and we need to make sure it works for them. That's why for instance the configure script is checked into CVS; it is of course heresy to put generated files in CVS, but it lets users build without having to fight the autoconf tools. It's for the same reason that we have wineinstall. Of course I'm all for improving the binary packages, but it doesn't avoid the need to also support source builds.
Yes, I agree that both routes should be as easy as possible :) I just think we should start telling users who are building from source for no real reason to use binaries instead.
thanks -mike